Nearly every top WRC driver is interested in Citroen, says Matton

Citroen, WRC's most successful team of the past decade with Sebastien Loeb, lost its dominant status to Volkswagen in the past four years.

The French team has decided to take a sabbatical for 2016, only entering select rounds with the private PH Sport squad, in order to focus on developing the new car for next year.

Kris Meeke, who won his two previous WRC events, has been confirmed to stay with the team, but the second and the potential third seats are yet to be officially taken and have attracted high interest, according to Matton.

"All I can tell is that nearly all the drivers involved in the championship at a high level are interested to drive a Citroen next year," he said.

"We were in Finland, which is always the start of the discussions, and I met with a lot of managers and drivers."

Thierry Neuville has been rumoured to be negotiating with Citroen but, should he stay with Hyundai, Stephane Lefebvre and Rally Finland podium finisher Craig Breen are strong candidates to become permanent pieces of the line-up.

Matton confirmed Citroen plans to field two full-time entries with a third part-time car, pending any regulation changes.

"The idea is to start the championship with two cars and in some events during the season we will run a third car.

"That is the plan for the moment, but it could be that regulations change and for the manufacturer championship you can nominate three cars instead of two.

"For sure if the regulation change, we will have to rethink our plan."

Regarding sponsorship for the team, Matton said: "We're finalising some agreements with Abu Dhabi and normally the main team will be with Abu Dhabi."

PH Sport to stay with the current cars

PH Sport, which had begun as a Citroen Junior Team in 2008, runs the Citroen DS3 cars this year.

While the FIA does not allow the current-spec cars to be run in next year's main class, the idea of a separate category for them has been brought up.

"The cars [of 2016] are owned by PH Sport. They will run the cars, for sure.

"The idea of the FIA, and I hope for the end of August to have more news about that, is to have a kind of a championship for the 2016 cars, but the package is not clear for the moment.

"They told us in Finland that they want to set up something."

Interview by Federico Faturos